Reading your post made me recognize myself, when you say you straightened the newspaper out to see what it is. I bought a butter holder recently, sent from Hungary and the seller did the same, I suppose she used like 50 weekly newspapers, to protect the ceramics. It was interesting to read the news from those pages.

Congrats on the bowls. Look really great, but painting on the cookbook? Breaks my heart 😂 I think I have a thing for cookbooks, although I don't use them anymore.